Environmental Management and Conservation

Water

Environmental management and stewardship programs integrate a broad spectrum of data with the analysis tools of GIS to provide a better understanding of how elements of natural communities interact across a landscape. GIS is used worldwide in ecology labs, planning departments, parks, agencies, and nonprofit organizations to promote sustainable growth. The Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers Watershed Council uses GIS for habitat, wetland, and water quality mapping and planning. It uses GIS to map the Sepulveda Basin including headwater stream watersheds, channel characteristics, seasonal flow, adjacent land uses, and natural features in the existing habitat.Learn more.

Oceans

Marine GIS uses data from oceans and seas to represent nearshore and deepwater phenomena such as current, salinity, temperature, biological and ecological mass, and density. The Surfrider Foundation has developed a GIS application called Beachscape that provides up-to-date coastal information at the community level. The South Florida Ecosystem Restoration Program uses GIS to establish baseline information about bottle-nosed dolphins in Florida Bay. The team locates a pod of dolphins and then records the sighting location using a GPS unit. They follow focal animals and input their findings into the geodatabase.Learn more.

Land

Accurate information about the local landscape is critical to making decisions about what to protect and how to protect it. Digital maps of sites can be linked to a relational database that stores topography, baseline data, site documentation, and aerial digital photography.

Tug Hill Tomorrow Land Trust uses GIS to spatially illustrate natural features in the area, identify landowners with whom the trust interacts, and evaluate the protection projects according to priorities and criteria. The GPS team looks for discharge points and outfalls that are potential sources for pollutants to be dumped into the creek.Learn more.

Wildlife

GIS is an important tool in habitat and species management and protection. GIS enables the study of animal populations at a variety of scales as well as analysis tools to study habitat corridors; migration patterns; and the influence of parks, reserves, and sanctuaries for wildlife conservation.

Wolves were studied at Bolivia's Muse de Historia Natural. Based on Landsat images using ERDAS and vegetation maps, researchers recorded 13 habitats used by wolves in the study site to estimate their total area. They were also able to show potential habitats for wolves.

Dolphins in Florida Bay are being studied by the Dolphin Ecology Project, as shown by the map to the right. GIS is instrumental in testing the hypothesis that dolphins feed preferentially in habitats where water quality is good and prey densities are high.

Sea turtle journeys are tracked from space using GIS, transmitters, and the ARGOS satellites. The Oceanic Resource Foundation found GIS helpful in determining the migratory corridors and habitat usage patterns of green sea turtles that nest on the beaches of Lechuguillas Veracruz, Mexico.

Learn more.

Vegetation

GIS is ideal for mapping and inventorying vegetation across landscapes and to better understand threatened and endangered species inventories for scientific and managerial applications.

The Indonesian government and the Wildlife Conservation Society Indonesia Program in Sulawesi use GIS to understand the biohabitat of Indonesia's preserve. The Mamirauá Project uses GIS to meet the conservancy's requirement of continually updating Mamirauá Reserve information. Its vegetation map is used to estimate forestry species stocks and monitor land clearing and subsistence agriculture.Learn more.